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Recently, the Australian Financial Review (p33, 5 April 2017), ran an article entitled “Hotspot experts led investors badly astray”. The article was about Riskwise a company of ‘investment gurus’ that espoused their investment expertise in the glossy mag ‘Your Investment Property’ in 2011 and 2012. It’s not an uncommon tale.

It sounds good, my business has reached a point where I don’t need much from my AFSL so why am I still paying all these fees? Others I know, are joining these low cost AFSL’s who give them the ability to operate their business without interference.

This may be the case, but before making that step, make sure that you not only look at the AFSL and their capability (in meeting the requirements of their license), but also look at the advisers in the network.

High performance sport has many lessons for businesses aspiring to be the best of breed. In a presentation outlining his long and successful rowing career James described some key points that are the hallmarks of his success that can translate to business success.

Tomorrow over 20-member firm representatives will fly into Sydney to begin the annual Futuro Forum. The forum focuses the owners of Corporate Representative firms in the Futuro network to come together for 2 days to focus their attention being better business people.

Dennis Bashford says there’s a two-part question every financial planner should ask themselves: How much time do I spend doing things my clients value, and how much time do I spend doing things they just don’t care about?

Last year Futuro surveyed its adviser network and over 90% of the respondents said the culture was the driving force for them staying with Futuro. Key to this culture is our Adviser Network Meetings (ANM).

Futuro Financial Services has expanded its management team with the appointment of Michael Frawley as National Manager of Advice.

Futuro needed a wide range of skills to fulfil this diverse role and recruiting for this type of role is extremely difficult. Futuro has always been patient and very selective about who it invites to become part of the team and as a result our management team has been together for a long time.

Non-aligned licensee Futuro Financial Services has announced it appointed a former Suncorp Financial Planning executive as its new national manager of advice.

According to his LinkedIn profile, Michael Frawley was previously Suncorp Financial Planning’s practice development manager.

Futuro announced yesterday it appointed Mr Frawley as its national manager of advice, which was a difficult role to fill.

Futuro managing director Paul Kelly said, “Recruiting for this type of role is always difficult because of the wide range of skills needed to properly fulfil the role and because Futuro has always been patient and very selective about who it invites to become part of the team.

“Looking for someone to take on the responsibilities of national manager of advice is difficult in that it requires someone who has had wide range of experience across virtually all aspects of the industry, from the actual management of an AFS licence through to an in depth understanding of compliance requirements as well as practice management.

“Not many have the experience or qualifications to take on this job so we see ourselves as being particularly fortunate to have found someone who can do the job, is a cultural fit and has such a great track record over his 23 years in our industry.”

David Favero remembers the portentous moment in his dad’s home office like it was yesterday.

It was, in fact, 15 years ago, but the recollection is crystal clear and freighted with the kind of poignancy peculiar to life-changing moments.

His father, Brian, who ran Favero Financial Services at the time, was anxious about the future of the business.

His clients were loyal and business was strong, but he was getting older and wanted to pass the baton at some stage.

Across the table from him, David, who could have been one of Brian’s clients, was ruminating on his own career.

“I was telling [Dad] I was a bit bored in my career, and things were getting stale,” David Favero recalls. “He was telling me he needed some fresh blood; and we just looked at each other and it dawned on us that we were the solution to each other’s problems.”

When David Favero graduated from university, he was reluctant to join his father’s financial planning business because he wanted to strike out on his own.

So he took a job in human resources and occupational health and safety at the Wagga Wagga Base Hospital, before finding a better fit as one of the trainers at the New Enterprise Incentive Scheme (NEIS).

“I loved it because I was helping people,” he says. “In my previous job in HR, I felt like I had just been pushing forms from one side of the desk to another. But in my role as an NEIS trainer, I helped people with their start-up businesses, and while not everyone succeeds, a lot of people do and that is gratifying.”

But after a decade in that role, having worked his way up to executive officer, there was nowhere for him to grow.

This time, his father’s business loomed as a viable, and much more attractive, option.

“I started [in Dad’s business] at the bottom, in admin and as a paraplanner, because I wanted to get to know the industry inside out.”

It turned out to be a timely move for the business. The FSR changes hit – to be followed by FoFA reforms. Suddenly, Brian Favero was inhabiting a very different planning world. He had to make the switch from insurance salesman to financial planner.

“He needed some new ideas and energy,” David says of his father’s business. “His clients took a while to get used to moving from being transactional and product clients to holistic clients. They weren’t used to being asked such personal questions.”

In 2005, Brian Favero suffered a heart attack and never returned to the business. He died some years later, but David knows his father was immensely proud of where he has taken the business.

“Between 2006 and 2009, we went through a massive growth phase, in which we quadrupled our revenue,” David says.

In 2016, he was named Futuro True Adviser of the Year for his dealings with a client who was diagnosed with Parkinson’s. The judges noted that he helped the man tick a number of things off his bucket list, as well as shaping his client’s financial direction at an especially vulnerable time in his life.

As for the future direction of the industry, Favero is hopeful, but notes the disruptive influence of robo-advice.

“For the DIY person, it will be very attractive,” he says. “But [a program] can’t sit across the table from someone and interpret the hopes and dreams of a client. They can’t read their body language. I do think they’re here to stay and [the trend is] going to get bigger, but I think they should be a complement to, and not a replacement for, holistic advice.”

Johanna Leggatt is a Melbourne-based freelance journalist with more than 15 years’ experience in news, features, lifestyle, property, finance, books and arts journalism, across both digital and print platforms. She has worked at both Fairfax and News Corp publications in Australia, as well as in digital roles in London with The Daily Telegraph and The Guardian.